WASHINGTON — Less than halfway through his first term, President Barack Obama has appointed more openly gay officials than any other president in history.

Days of Lot

“And as it was in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. They did eat, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, and the flood came, and destroyed them all. Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded. But the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed. ”
—Luke 17:26-30

Time To Look Up

“And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.”
—Luke 21:28

Gay activists say the estimate of more than 150 appointments so far — from agency heads and commission members to policy officials and senior staffers — surpasses the previous high of about 140 reached during two full terms under President Bill Clinton.

“From everything we hear from inside the administration, they wanted this to be part of their efforts at diversity,” said Denis Dison, spokesman for the Presidential Appointments Project of the Gay & Lesbian Leadership Institute.

The pace of appointments has helped to ease broader disappointment among gay rights groups that Obama has not acted more quickly on other fronts, such as ending the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that bans gays from serving openly in the military.

In a sign of how times have changed, few of the appointees — about two dozen required Senate confirmation — have stirred much controversy. It’s a far cry from the 1993 furor surrounding Clinton’s nomination of then-San Francisco Supervisor Roberta Achtenberg as assistant secretary for Housing and Urban Development.

Achtenberg was the first openly gay official to serve at such a senior level, and she won confirmation despite contentious hearings and Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C., who denounced her as a “militant extremist.”

“It’s both significant and rather ordinary,” said Michael Cole, a spokesman for the gay rights group Human Rights Campaign. “It’s a simple affirmation of the American ideal that what matters is how you do your job and not who you are.”

Gay activists, among Obama’s strongest supporters, had hoped he would be the first to appoint an openly gay Cabinet secretary. While that hasn’t happened — yet — Obama did appoint the highest-ranking gay official ever when he named John Berry as director of the Office of Personnel Management, which oversees the nation’s 1.9 million federal workers.

Other prominent names include Nancy Sutley, chairwoman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, and Fred Hochberg, chairman of the Export-Import Bank. Obama also named Amanda Simpson, the first openly transgender appointee, as a senior technical adviser in the Commerce Department.

White House spokesman Shin Inouye confirmed the record number, saying Obama has hired more gay officials than the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations combined. He said Obama “is proud that his appointments reflect the diversity of the American public.”

“He is committed to appointing highly qualified individuals for each post,” Inouye said. “We have made a record number of openly LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender) appointments and we are confident that this number will only continue to grow.”

Dison’s group lists 124 of the appointees on its website. He said the remainder are not listed because they are lower-level officials not formally announced by the White House.

“We learn about a lot of these through informal networks and then work to confirm that they are indeed appointed and that they are openly LGBT,” Dison said.

One Obama nominee who met some opposition was Chai Feldblum, a Georgetown University law professor nominated to serve on the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

Concerned Women for America accused Feldblum of playing “a major role in pushing the homosexual and transsexual agenda on Americans.” Other conservative groups blasted her role in drafting the Employment Nondiscrimination Act, a bill that would ban employers from discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity. Obama is a strong supporter of that legislation.

Obama made Feldblum a recess appointment in March after an anonymous hold in the Senate held up her confirmation for months.

Another target for conservatives was Kevin Jennings, founder of the Gay, Lesbian, Straight Education Network, who was named to oversee the Education Department’s Office of Safe & Drug Free Schools. More than 50 House Republicans asked Obama to remove Jennings from the post after reports surfaced about advice he gave more than 20 years earlier after learning a gay student had sex with an older man.

Jennings conceded that he should have consulted medical or legal authorities instead of telling the 15-year-old boy that he hoped he had used a condom. The Obama administration defended Jennings and declined to remove him.

It was in early 2008 that the Gay & Lesbian Leadership Institute focused its Presidential Appointments Project on steering thousands of resumes of qualified gay professionals to White House jobs. Dison said that push has helped increase the numbers, though it certainly helped to have a more receptive White House.

Cole, of the Human Rights Campaign, called the increase a welcome development, but said there is more focus on real legislative gains, such as ending “don’t ask, don’t tell” and repealing the Defense of Marriage Act, which prohibits federal recognition of same-sex partnerships.

“For a community that is denied their equality, there will continue to be frustration at the pace of change,” he said.

National Public Radio terminated the contract it had with news analyst Juan Williams after he said on a Fox News show that he gets “nervous” when he sees people on planes in “Muslim garb.”

To view dictionary popup window put your cursor on the blue words

Truth In Exile

“Yea, truth faileth•Strongs 5737: adar, aw-dar´; a primitive root; to arrange, as a battle, a vineyard (to hoe); hence, to muster and so to miss (or find wanting):—dig, fail, keep (rank), lack.; and he that departeth•Strongs 5493: suwr, soor; a primitive root; to turn off (literal or figurative):—be(-head), bring, call back, decline, depart, eschew, get (you), go (aside), x grievous, lay away (by), leave undone, be past, pluck away, put (away, down), rebel, remove (to and fro), revolt, x be sour, take (away, off), turn (aside, away, in), withdraw, be without. from evil maketh himself a prey•Strongs 7997: shalal, shaw-lal´; a primitive root; to drop or strip; by implication, to plunder:—let fall, make self a prey, x of purpose, (make a, (take)) spoil.: and the LORD saw it, and it displeased him that there was no judgment.”
—Isaiah 59:15

Ishmael•FYI: Ishmael is the son of Abraham through Hagar, the maid of Abraham’s wife Sarah.
Ishmael is the Biblical father of the Arab nations. •From these nations came Mohammad, who in approximately 632 a.d founded the Religion of Islam.
•The verse below is speaking directly concerning Ishmael and the nations that would come from this direct descendent of Abraham.

“And he will be a wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man’s hand against him; and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.”
—Genesis 16:12

Williams made his comments to Fox News host Bill O’Reilly on Monday on the “O’Reilly Factor.”

“Look, Bill, I’m not a bigot,” Williams said on the program. “You know the kind of books I’ve written about the civil rights movement in this country. But when I get on the plane, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in Muslim garb and I think, you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as Muslims, I get worried. I get nervous.”

NPR issued a statement noting that Williams was a valuable contributor but that his remarks “undermined his credibility as a news analyst with NPR.”

Williams is an analyst and commentator with Fox News, which is owned by News Corp., publisher of the Wall Street Journal.

On a story posted on NPR’s web site, Williams declined to comment.

What do you think? Leave your thoughts in the comments.

Faith organizations and individuals who view homosexuality as sinful and refuse to provide services to gay people are losing a growing number of legal battles that they say are costing them their religious freedom.

To view dictionary popup window put your cursor on the blue scripture words.

The Falling Away

“Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away•Strongs 646: apostasia, ap-os-tas-ee´-ah; feminine of the same as 647; defection from truth (properly, the state) (“apostasy”):—falling away, forsake. first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition;”
—2 Thessalonians 2:3

“And now we call the proud•Strongs 2086: zed, zade´; from 2102; arrogant:—presumptuous, proud. happy; yea, they that work wickedness•Strongs 7564: rish{ah, rish-aw´; feminine of 7562; wrong (especially moral):—fault, wickedly(-ness). are set up; yea, they that tempt •Strongs 974: bachan, baw-khan´; a primitive root; to test (especially metals); generally and figuratively, to investigate:—examine, prove, tempt, try (trial). God are even delivered •Strongs 4422: malat, maw-lat´; a primitive root; properly, to be smooth, i.e. (by implication) to escape (as if by slipperiness); causatively, to release or rescue; specifically, to bring forth young, emit sparks:—deliver (self), escape, lay, leap out, let alone, let go, preserve, save, x speedily, x surely..”
—Mal 3:15

Truth In Exile

“Yea, truth faileth•Strongs 5737: {adar, aw-dar´; a primitive root; to arrange, as a battle, a vineyard (to hoe); hence, to muster and so to miss (or find wanting):—dig, fail, keep (rank), lack.; and he that departeth•Strongs 5493: suwr, soor; a primitive root; to turn off (literal or figurative):—be(-head), bring, call back, decline, depart, eschew, get (you), go (aside), x grievous, lay away (by), leave undone, be past, pluck away, put (away, down), rebel, remove (to and fro), revolt, x be sour, take (away, off), turn (aside, away, in), withdraw, be without. from evil maketh himself a prey•Strongs 7997: shalal, shaw-lal´; a primitive root; to drop or strip; by implication, to plunder:—let fall, make self a prey, x of purpose, (make a, (take)) spoil.: and the LORD saw it, and it displeased him that there was no judgment.”
—Isaiah 59:15

The lawsuits have resulted from states and communities that have banned discrimination based on sexual orientation. Those laws have created a clash between the right to be free from discrimination and the right to freedom of religion, religious groups said, with faith losing. They point to what they say are ominous recent examples:

– A Christian photographer was forced by the New Mexico Civil Rights Commission to pay $6,637 in attorney’s costs after she refused to photograph a gay couple’s commitment ceremony.

– A psychologist in Georgia was fired after she declined for religious reasons to counsel a lesbian about her relationship.

– Christian fertility doctors in California who refused to artificially inseminate a lesbian patient were barred by the state Supreme Court from invoking their religious beliefs in refusing treatment.

– A Christian student group was not recognized at a University of California law school because it denies membership to anyone practicing sex outside of traditional marriage.

“It really is all about religious liberty for us,” said Scott Hoffman, chief administrative officer of a New Jersey Methodist group, the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association, which lost a property tax exemption after it declined to allow its beachside pavilion to be used for a same-sex union ceremony. “The protection to not be forced to do something that is against deeply held religious principles.”

But gay groups and liberal legal scholars say they are prevailing because an individual’s religious views about homosexuality cannot be used to violate gays’ right to equal treatment under the law.

“We are not required to pay the price for other people’s religious views about us,” said Jennifer Pizer, director of the Marriage Project for Lambda Legal, a gay rights legal advocacy group.

Twelve states now offer some form of same-sex marriage or same-sex partner recognition. Twenty states — including Maryland — and more than 180 cities and counties, including the District, ban discrimination against gays, according to the Human Rights Campaign, a gay rights group. Virginia bans it against state employees.

These laws generally offer some type of exemption to religious entities when hiring employees. But some groups are working to expand that exemption to include commercial businesses to protect owners and their employees when exercising their religious views.

Gay rights groups said they do not object to making faith groups’ religious jobs exempt from the discrimination laws but that offering services to the public is different.

“In their role as a participant in the marketplace, they are being required to do that in a non-discriminatory way,” said Brian Moulton, Human Rights Campaign senior counsel.

Battles are increasingly including private businesses. Last August, the California Supreme Court ruled in favor of Guadalupe Benitez, who is a lesbian, when she sued the North Coast Women’s Care Medical Group after doctors said their religious beliefs prevented them from artificially inseminating her.

“We were devastated,” said Benitez, 37, who has been with partner Joanne Clark for almost two decades. Sexual orientation “should never have been an issue,” she said. “The issue was that I had a medical condition.”

The court ruled that North Coast Women’s Care did not have a free-speech right or a religious exemption from the state antidiscrimination law.

Sometimes, organizations that don’t wish to serve gays give in rather than go to court.

The online dating site eHarmony agreed to provide gay and lesbian matchmaking services to settle a complaint by a gay New Jersey man accusing it of discrimination. The new site, CompatiblePartners.net, started Tuesday.

The site eHarmony, founded by evangelical psychologist Neil Clark Warren, does not provide a same-sex option. Warren said his research into successful relationships did not include same-sex couples.

Company attorneys said that it settled because of the unpredictable nature of litigation and that New Jersey’s attorney general did not find that eHarmony had violated the state’s anti-discrimination law.

“People seem to say that if you enter the world of commerce, you lose all your First Amendment rights” to free exercise of religion, said Jordan Lorence, senior counsel at the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian legal organization that has represented several businesses. “They . . . have become nothing more than vending machines, and the government can dictate the conditions under which they dispense their goods and services.”

Even when groups opposing homosexuality have prevailed in court, they have gone on to face other setbacks. The Boy Scouts of America won a lawsuit in 2000 because it did not allow openly gay Scouts or Scout leaders. Since then, some private charities have refused to support the Scouts, and some local governments have yanked free use of facilities and other benefits. In Philadelphia, the city is demanding that the Scouts pay $200,000 in annual rent for a building that they had been using rent-free. The dispute is in court.

Some scholars also point to Bob Jones University, which lost its tax exemption over a ban on interracial dating and marriage among students, even though it claimed that those beliefs were religiously grounded. Some legal analysts suggest that religious groups that do not support gay rights might lose their tax exemptions because of their politically unpopular views.

Jonathan Turley, a law professor at George Washington University who supports same-sex marriage, said the Bob Jones ruling “puts us on a slippery slope that inevitably takes us to the point where we punish religious groups because of their religious views.”

Both sides predict more litigation as gay rights bump up against strong religious beliefs.

Marc Stern, general counsel for American Jewish Congress, said: “When you have a change that is as dramatic as has happened in the last 10 to 15 years with regards to attitudes toward homosexuality, it’s inevitable it’s going to reverberate in dozens of places in the law that you’re never going to be able to foresee.”

Perilous Times

“This know also, that in the last days perilous•Strongs 5467: chalepos, khal-ep-os´; perhaps from 5465 through the idea of reducing the strength; difficult, i.e. dangerous, or (by implication) furious:—fierce, perilous. times shall come.”
—2 Timothy 3:1-2a

Editors note about the word perilous•FYI: The Greek word (chalepos) (perilous) is only used one other time in the New Testament, Matthew 8:28. There it is translated as (fierce) when describing the nature of the devils that possess Legion and his cohort..

Truth In Exile

“Yea, truth faileth•Strongs 5737: {adar, aw-dar´; a primitive root; to arrange, as a battle, a vineyard (to hoe); hence, to muster and so to miss (or find wanting):—dig, fail, keep (rank), lack.; and he that departeth•Strongs 5493: suwr, soor; a primitive root; to turn off (literal or figurative):—be(-head), bring, call back, decline, depart, eschew, get (you), go (aside), x grievous, lay away (by), leave undone, be past, pluck away, put (away, down), rebel, remove (to and fro), revolt, x be sour, take (away, off), turn (aside, away, in), withdraw, be without. from evil maketh himself a prey•Strongs 7997: shalal, shaw-lal´; a primitive root; to drop or strip; by implication, to plunder:—let fall, make self a prey, x of purpose, (make a, (take)) spoil.: and the LORD saw it, and it displeased him that there was no judgment.”
—Isaiah 59:15

A member of the U.S. military whose suspicions about Barack Obama’s eligibility to be president prompted him to sign onto a legal demand being sent to Attorney General Eric Holder has now been silenced.

Attorney Orly Taitz, the California activist who through her DefendOurFreedoms.us foundation is assembling the case, told WND today she’s been informed one of the members of the military has been ordered by commanding officers not to speak with media.

The officer’s identity was withheld to prevent further actions against him.

However, Taitz confirmed to WND there would be no lack of plaintiffs in her action, which challenges Obama to prove by what authority he operates as commander in chief.

Another active-duty soldier, who identified himself as Staff Sgt. Alan Craig James, volunteered to be identified publicly as a plaintiff in the case, Taitz said.

She said she already has a list of 101 volunteers in her case demanding Obama’s proof of eligibility.

WND has reported on dozens of legal challenges to Obama’s status as a “natural born citizen.” The Constitution, Article 2, Section 1, states, “No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President.”

Some of the lawsuits question whether he was actually born in Hawaii, as he insists. If he was born out of the country, Obama’s American mother, the suits contend, was too young at the time of his birth to confer American citizenship to her son under the law at the time.

Other challenges have focused on Obama’s citizenship through his father, a Kenyan subject to the jurisdiction of the United Kingdom at the time of his birth, thus making him a dual citizen. The cases contend the framers of the Constitution excluded dual citizens from qualifying as natural born.

Where’s the proof Barack Obama was born in the U.S. or that he fulfills the “natural-born American” clause in the Constitution? If you still want to see it, join more than 300,000 others and sign up now!

As WND reported this week, Taitz has assembled officers from the U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines to seek Obama’s documentation.

The plaintiffs are citing the legal standard of Quo Warranto, which also was cited in a case brought by New Jersey attorney Mario Apuzzo on behalf of Charles Kerchner and others.

The idea, first recorded some 800 years ago, essentially is a demand to know what authority Obama is using to act as president. An online constitutional resource says Quo Warranto “affords the only judicial remedy for violations of the Constitution by public officials and agents.”

Among those requesting the action are Maj. Gen. Carroll Childers; Lt. Col. Dr. David Earl-Graef; police officer and Selected Reservist Navy Commander Clinton Grimes; Lt. Scott Easterling, now serving on active duty in Iraq; New Hampshire state Rep. Timothy Comerford; and Tennessee state Rep. Frank Nicely.

“As president-elect, Respondent Obama failed to submit prima facie evidence of his qualifications before January 20, 2009. Election officers failed to challenge, validate or evaluate his qualifications. Relators submit that as president elect, Respondent Obama failed [to] qualify per U.S. CONST. Amend. XX [paragraph] 3,” the document said.

John Eidsmoe, an expert on the U.S. Constitution now working with the Foundation on Moral Law, an organization founded by former Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore, said the demand is a legitimate course of action.

“She basically is asking, ‘By what authority’ is Obama president,” he told WND. “In other words, ‘I want you to tell me by what authority. I don’t really think you should hold the office.’”

The letter has been dispatched to Holder, asking him to appoint a special prosecutor for the case.

Eidsmoe said it’s clear that Obama has something in the documentation of his history, including his birth certificate, college records and other documents that “he does not want the public to know.”

Obama’s critics warn of a constitutional crisis should it be discovered Obama is ineligible and the resulting chaos of trying to figure out what, if any, of his executive branch orders should be valid.

According to the online Constitution.org resource: “The common law writ of Quo Warranto has been suppressed at the federal level in the United States, and deprecated at the state level, but remains a right under the Ninth Amendment which was understood and presumed by the Founders, and which affords the only judicial remedy for violations of the Constitution by public officials and agents.”

Taitz told WND the “relators” in the Quo Warranto case include members of the Army, Air Force, Marines and Army and feature recipients of some of the highest honors the nation awards, including the Purple Heart.

According to author Chester Antieau in his “The Practice of Extraordinary Remedies,” Quo Warranto is one of the oldest rights in common law.

“The earliest case on record appears in the 9th year of Richard I, 1198,” he wrote. “The statute of 9 Anne c. 20 in 1710 authorized a proper officer of a court, with leave of the court, to exhibit an information in the nature of Quo Warranto, at the ‘relation’ of any person desiring to prosecute the same – to be called the relator. Early American statutes were modeled after the Statute of Anne and, indeed, the statute has often been ruled to be part of the common law we inherited from England.”

Antieau noted the Pennsylvania Supreme Court has ruled, “Quo Warranto is addressed to preventing a continued exercise of authority unlawfully asserted, rather than to correct what has already been done. …”

Its first recognized purpose, he said, is “to determine the title of persons claiming possession of public offices and to oust them if they are found to be usurpers.”

Although Obama officials have told WND all such allegations are “garbage,” here is a partial listing and status update for some of the cases over Obama’s eligibility:

New Jersey attorney Mario Apuzzo has filed a case on behalf of Charles Kerchner and others alleging Congress didn’t properly ascertain that Obama is qualified to hold the office of president.

Pennsylvania Democrat Philip Berg has three cases pending, including Berg vs. Obama in the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, a separate Berg vs. Obama which is under seal at the U.S. District Court level and Hollister vs. Soetoro a/k/a Obama, brought on behalf of a retired military member who could be facing recall to active duty by Obama.

Leo Donofrio of New Jersey filed a lawsuit claiming Obama’s dual citizenship disqualified him from serving as president. His case was considered in conference by the U.S. Supreme Court but denied a full hearing.

Cort Wrotnowski filed suit against Connecticut’s secretary of state, making a similar argument to Donofrio. His case was considered in conference by the U.S. Supreme Court, but was denied a full hearing.

Former presidential candidate Alan Keyes headlines a list of people filing a suit in California, in a case handled by the United States Justice Foundation, that asks the secretary of state to refuse to allow the state’s 55 Electoral College votes to be cast in the 2008 presidential election until Obama verifies his eligibility to hold the office. The case is pending, and lawyers are seeking the public’s support.

Chicago attorney Andy Martin sought legal action requiring Hawaii Gov. Linda Lingle to release Obama’s vital statistics record. The case was dismissed by Hawaii Circuit Court Judge Bert Ayabe.

Lt. Col. Donald Sullivan sought a temporary restraining order to stop the Electoral College vote in North Carolina until Barack Obama’s eligibility could be confirmed, alleging doubt about Obama’s citizenship. His case was denied.

In Ohio, David M. Neal sued to force the secretary of state to request documents from the Federal Elections Commission, the Democratic National Committee, the Ohio Democratic Party and Obama to show the presidential candidate was born in Hawaii. The case was denied.

Also in Ohio, there was the Greenberg v. Brunner case which ended when the judge threatened to assess all case costs against the plaintiff.

In Washington state, Steven Marquis sued the secretary of state seeking a determination on Obama’s citizenship. The case was denied.

In Georgia, Rev. Tom Terry asked the state Supreme Court to authenticate Obama’s birth certificate. His request for an injunction against Georgia’s secretary of state was denied by Georgia Superior Court Judge Jerry W. Baxter.

California attorney Orly Taitz has brought a case, Lightfoot vs. Bowen, on behalf of Gail Lightfoot, the vice presidential candidate on the ballot with Ron Paul, four electors and two registered voters.
In addition, other cases cited on the RightSideofLife blog as raising questions about Obama’s eligibility include:

In Texas, Darrel Hunter vs. Obama later was dismissed.

In Ohio, Gordon Stamper vs. U.S. later was dismissed.

In Texas, Brockhausen vs. Andrade.

In Washington, L. Charles Cohen vs. Obama.

In Hawaii, Keyes vs. Lingle, dismissed.
Corsi had gone to both Kenya and Hawaii prior to the election to investigate issues surrounding Obama’s birth. But his research and discoveries only raised more questions, the biggest being why, if there exists documentation of Obama’s eligibility, hasn’t it been released to quell the rumors.

Instead, a series of law firms have been hired on Obama’s behalf around the nation to prevent any public access to his birth certificate, passport records, college records and other documents.